


come and go with a haze

by nextgreatadventure



Category: Sanctuary (TV)
Genre: 5 Things, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-10
Updated: 2012-11-10
Packaged: 2017-11-18 09:13:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/559317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nextgreatadventure/pseuds/nextgreatadventure
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>five times helen and will and tents. teepees and canopies and tarps on sticks are tents too, right?</p>
            </blockquote>





	come and go with a haze

**Author's Note:**

  * For [missparker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/missparker/gifts).



> for my partner in crime because HEY LOOK OVER THERE. 
> 
> I think I was supposed to write helen and will on safari but that...is probably not what this is. but similar adventures ensue! I MISS THESE FOOLS.

\--

 

 **1**.

Apparently, Helen Magnus paints her toenails fire engine red.

Will sits across from her, also barefoot, and tries to ignore the strange surge of pleasure this knowledge brings him. Inadvertently, he’s been collecting these moments like some sort of psychological hoarder, these small (probably meaningless) glimpses of herself that Magnus has been revealing to him as they get to know one another. These part-intimacies and half-confessions.

Will Zimmerman and Helen Magnus are feeling out a brand new relationship that hasn’t yet been defined. It _should_ be defined because they both dutifully and constantly man their respective stations (mentor, protege; boss, employee; medical doctor, shrink) but Helen is still such a mystery and Will such a beautifully unfolding surprise that their list of possible definitions just keeps on growing and growing.

Ashley brings around more gleaming rice with turmeric and golden raisins. Helen eats with her fingers while she listens to Will talk about what it was like when he worked for the Bureau. Her eyes stay on his face and he doesn’t want to admit to himself why it’s distracting, so he doesn’t, but there’s the hint of a smirk on her lips (slick with olive oil) that says she knows anyway.

Sometimes he wonders if she’s testing him in some bizarre way with the way she looks at him sometimes, with the way she withholds and also confides. He wonders if she's tested all the others like this, just pushing and pushing, waiting to see when they’ll break.

 

Sometimes, she thinks she might be testing him, too. Helen hasn't had a protege in years, hasn't stumbled along a bond like the one unfolding between Will Zimmerman and herself in decades. It is possible that she has simply been waiting for him all this time, that none of the others ever really mattered. The moment he agreed to stay, Helen had felt, finally, like exhaling (it is also possible that she needs him more than she thinks he needs her).

Helen Magnus sprawls beneath the Moroccan canopy with Will on one side of her and Ashley on the other. Helen smiles as her daughter tells Will stories of narrow escapes across Slovakian borders, unexpected alliances made in unexpected places, miracles witnessed on the front lines of battle between creatures too magnificent to describe. The sort of things he can come to expect now that the world has opened up for him. Helen tries to imagine how their lives must sound to Will's unaccustomed ears. She wonders how she and Ashley must seem to him. Will’s new understanding likely comes to him in heavy blows but he, too, is quite magnificent. She pushes him in the ways she does because if he is going to spook, she wants it to happen sooner rather than later (before she grows entirely too fond to let him go impassively). But really, she isn’t worried. Much.

Helen watches her daughter, watches Will, and she tries to remind herself not to do anything that will harden her further still, like read into the knowing grins that Will and Ashley often exchange. Grins that exclude Helen for one reason or another, reminding her of the one constant truth of her existence: she is still as removed from them both as the Moon is from the Earth.

And yet so often Will looks at Helen, and only at Helen. He fixes her with the smile that he’s fixing her with now, in the tent beneath the stars, and she feels drunk with the sort of power she knows she could wield over him if only she let herself. If only she truly wanted to. Someday, she may have to.

Mostly, Helen tries to remind herself not to do anything foolish, like continue to realize that even though all things considered they are perhaps more removed than connected, Will is still, deep down, just a lonely man. And she is still, after nearly two centuries, just a lonely woman.

 

 **2**.

“They’re tremendously intelligent creatures.”

Will raises both brows. “They’re still giant snake-elephants. I’m not taking any chances.”

Magnus ignores this. “Grootslangs covet gems. They are fearsome, I’ll admit, but many tales tell of victims bartering jewels for freedom. I intend to barter jewels for a few minutes calm discussion.”

Will has shimmied into his sleeping bag. He leans against an elbow and props a hand against his head, facing her. “Okay yeah, well, many tales also tell of victims’ bodies being sliced open to slick the bloodlust of the supposedly intelligent Grootslang.”

It’s like she isn’t listening to him at all. “The cave is said to be filled with diamonds,” Magnus tells him, eyes sparkling.

“Okay,” Will sighs. “Whatever. But when something bad happens...”

“Feel free to gloat. But nothing will.”

Will gives her a disbelieving look. “All I’m saying is that this is Africa, and it sure as hell wouldn’t be the first time. There’s some eerie hoodoo stuff going on in this place, I’m telling you.”

Magnus tears her concentration away from the maps long enough to roll her eyes at him. “Yes, I’ve been here before, Will. Trust me, with creatures like this the best course of action is always unarmed diplomacy. If we go in there guns blazing, I can’t tell you how offended he’ll be.”

“You’d have made a terrible colonizer,” Will yawns.

 

Breakfast the next morning consists of tea and porridge and a more than a dash of anxiety. Will watches Magnus dip a tea bag in and out of her mug as they sit side by side on the river bank. It’s barely seven AM but there’s a swirling purplish-black mass in the wide sky overhead, blocking out the magenta sunrise. It feels like something wants them to leave.

“Maybe you were right,” Magnus says, eyeing the storm warily.

“So what do we do, carry around a magic root and hope for the best?”

“Centuries-old mystical tradition isn’t something to be trifled with, Will. Especially not on this continent.”

There is something in her voice that makes him frown, because it sounds like she’s had first-hand experience and is not keen on a repeat performance.

“We need to get going,” Magnus sighs, standing up. “It’s a long hike into the mountains.”

 

It’s nearly dark when they reach the cave. Made of rock and red dirt, stippled with overgrown leaves, the thing looks like it was hacked out of the earth with a colossal blunt ax rather than formed naturally by something relatively innocuous like wind or rain.

“Shall we?” Magnus strips away her pack. While Will takes a long pull from his water bottle, she rummages around for the small pouch that will hopefully keep them from getting killed tonight.

“It’s...not here.”

“Excuse me?”

“The gems. They’re gone.” Instead of sounding shocked or angry, Magnus sounds resigned. “Damn it. Something has been following us since we left. I didn’t want to say anything in case I spooked them, but I’m sure we crossed a fairy circle three hours ago.”

“A...what?”

“I’m afraid the Grootslang isn’t the only intelligent abnormal in these mountains.”

Will runs a hand along the back of his neck. “Great, and we _all_ want the jewels. Actually, you and I are the ones that actually _need_ them. If we don’t have them won’t the Grootslang go berserk on us?”

Magnus bites her lip. “It’s possible, yes. We have nothing else of value to him.” Will sighs. Magnus glances to him. “Except...”

He raises his brows. “Except what?”

“Well except for us, obviously.” It is a testament to the unrivaled passion she has for her work that for a moment, she looks like she might ask Will to sacrifice himself, and it is a testament to how helplessly loyal he is to her that for a moment, he almost considers it. 

Suddenly, a low rumble shakes the ground and a shrieking, trumpet-like call fills the air. Something darker than the twilight flits across the sky, and all light remaining there is abruptly extinguished.

“We need to leave, _now_.” Magnus grabs Will’s hand.

But it’s too late, because the Grootslang is slithering and stomping its way from the shadows of the cave mouth towards them. He is absolutely terrifying in his enormity, all solid muscle mass and bulging, furious eyes. Will forgets to breathe. It doesn’t matter anyway, because a moment later the Grootslang is bellowing at them and it’s echoing off even the more distant hills and Will couldn’t move to breathe even if he tried. Whatever the creature is roaring at them sounds like a curse if Will’s ever heard one and his mind spends a few frantic seconds trying to problem solve this deeply unfortunate situation, but suddenly his skin is on fire and everything goes red, then completely black.

 

Helen isn’t exactly sure what the Grootslang has done to Will, except for there are all sorts of gravely alarming stories that have come from tales of Grootslang encounters and perhaps this is just one sample of the wide, wide collection.

Will is slumped, slack-jawed and delirious against the cave mouth and he’s been mumbling and rambling to himself for the last twenty minutes while Helen did her best to keep them both alive. His hands wring at Helen’s limbs and at her clothes and he seems desperate for something only she can give him, but she has no idea on earth what it is.

“Please,” she begs the beast. “He is my friend. Without him I’ll be alone. It might take me days to find my way out of here on my own.”

“I spare your lives,” the Grootslang growls, “though you come to me empty-handed. One of you must suffer. Know that I am merciful, but that the land is wild and vengeful, and it will do all it can to keep you here. _I_ will not do more. Go. Now.”

 

It takes another two hours to find a place to rest for the night and Helen is exhausted from the encounter and from worrying about Will, from having to carry both their packs by herself because he can barely _walk_ , let alone help her. Helen sets up the tent and unpacks medical supplies while Will drifts in and out of his own dreams. Later, she lets him rest his head in her lap because he seems so upset when she moves away and she isn’t sure how else to comfort him.

“I love you,” he mumbles at her. The wind and the rain are slapping and shaking the canvass like hecklers. “Magnus, I love you. Since I first laid eyes on you.”

Helen closes her eyes. “I love you too, Will,” she says. “Please, get some sleep.”

“Where is Ashley?” He asks suddenly, trying to sit up. Helen freezes. It takes her a few seconds to recover.

She cannot bring herself to give him the truth, delirious as he is, and so she lays a hand against his chest and says, “Not here. Please, go to sleep.”

Will keeps on talking. “I love Ashley, too. But differently, differently than I love you. I love her like a sister. Maybe--maybe I love you the same way I loved my mom. I don’t know. But you’re not her.”

Helen anxiously slides the five fingers that aren't resting against Will's head along the gun at her side. She can’t tell whether those noises coming from outside are just the weather, or whether they’re just masking something more malign. “No. I’m not.”

“The way I feel about you is--is so... _confusing_...” The gash on Will’s shoulder must be throbbing unbearably, but he doesn’t appear to notice. The sterile bandage she’d placed there before is soaked completely through. Helen can see the blood beginning to trickle down his arm. “I just want you to be proud of me, Magnus. I want to...surprise you.” Will takes in a deep, shuddering breath. “I want to hold doors open for you. I want you to let me touch you more, for longer. I--I want you to _talk_ to me, Magnus. I want to mean something special to you...”

Helen knows he will not remember this tomorrow. His head is lulling off to the side and he’s sweating something fierce, though it’s a cold storm outside. All she has to do is get him to sleep so that this daze can wear itself off. Nine or ten hours should do it (she hopes, badly), and then he’ll be able to help her navigate their way out of this. He’ll get better and he won’t remember any of his words and eventually, she’ll be able to forget them, too.

“You _are_ special to me.” This is not the time nor place nor mental state she would have picked for this conversation, but Will looks so small and mindless and needing that she can’t not engage.

He sighs deeply, and then becomes restless, squirming and wiggling and grabbing and splaying his hands across whatever parts of her he can reach like he’ll fall straight through the ground if he doesn’t hold on.

“Shh, Will. Will. It’s all right.” Her skin against his is the only thing that seems to calm him, and so she scoots down and holds him close, cradles his face in her hands, looks into his eyes.

“I--d-don’t know...w-what’s h-happening,” he whispers to her, lips white and eyes red.

Helen strokes her thumbs across his cheeks in a repetitive, soothing motion. She has a flash of doing the same for Ashley and Henry when they were sick as children. “If I didn’t know better I’d say the Grootslang put a hex on you,” she says quietly, more to herself than to him. “I’m not sure how he managed it, but you were right, Will. I should have taken your protests more seriously.”

Will shudders, a whimper creaking from his throat. He tries to bury his face further into her hands. “I don’t care.” His voice is muffled. “I love you.”

When he begins to shake, and badly, Helen feels absolutely useless because this isn’t something she can doctor, it isn’t something she can medicate and treat. She pulls Will closer against her chest and hugs him, presses her lips to his temple and doesn’t pull away.

The night grows more tortuous and uneasy but eventually Will drifts off again into a fumbling, disturbed sleep. Helen’s muscles hurt from holding their bodies so close together but she doesn’t move for fear of waking him. She closes her eyes. She drags her fingers up and down small patches of his bare skin, tries not to think, and waits for morning.

 

They are in her office late one Sunday night when Will emits a low groan and Helen glances sharply across the room. Will slides his index finger between the pages of the giant Abnormal encyclopedia to keep his place and meets her questioning eyes.

“Remember the Grootslang? Apparently, they are capable messing with human brain chemistry. Nobody knows how they do it, but they can manipulate your physical and mental well-being simultaneously and send you into a...” he peers down at the page again and holds up quotation fingers, “...’ _delirium induced by the insecurities of the victims’ own subconscious_.’” The book snaps shut. “That’s wild.”

Magnus arches a brow.

“I think I got off lucky,” he says.

“Mm,” Magnus replies, glancing back down to the stack of paperwork beneath her hands but not really registering it. “Yes. Just a bad fever.”

“You never told me much about that night.”

“Nothing to tell, really.”

Will thumbs the spine of the encyclopedia a little. “Well, you’re constantly saving my ass, Magnus. It can’t have been a picnic, but I thank you for it.”

Magnus smiles, but it is a shade troubled. “It’s my pleasure, Will.”

 

 **3**.

The Polx ritual of Unity and Renewal is one that Will has not yet witnessed.

The Polx are a small Abnormal tribe of Northern Canada with empathic capabilities and Magnus has many friends and allies among them. It is nearly December, their holy month, and Magnus informs Will that every other year she makes it a priority to visit, as it is their custom (and frankly, expectation) to forge and maintain strong bonds. This year, she had asked if Will would like to join her.

“They are very...familial,” Magnus had told him, although it had seemed like maybe she wasn’t quite satisfied with the term in the given context, or possibly that she was leaving out a complicated and unnecessary explanation for his benefit. “The importance of close personal relationships is like scripture to them. They work and strive for them like other cultures strive for a strong economy or military might.”

It is just shy of freezing in the northern provinces this time of year, but the Polx have teepee-like dwellings with hot open fires in the center that keep everyone very warm.

The children are all in bed; Will learns that this particular ritual is for Polx who have already had their two-decade or three-decade ceremony.

Many men and many women partake in the ritual. The Polx speak a native language that Will can’t even hope to translate, but Magnus seems to know enough to follow easily along. She’s been to a lot of these things, after all.

There seems to be little rhyme or reason to the whole thing, and yet it _is_ rhythmic, and the longer Will observes, the more _some_ sort of pattern emerges, even though he can’t decipher what that pattern might be. Magnus has brushed him up on the very basics of the Polx, but he’s only spent one day with them so far. They are a very complicated, proud, intelligent people. He still has a lot to learn.

The rite revolves around the breaking and sharing of warm crusts of poppy seed bread. The Polx take turns saying a few words while others echo them, and then pieces of the bread are offered, fed directly from one hand to another’s mouth. It is an extremely inclusive process; the same people who break then _receive_ the bread, and vice versa, back and forth and over and over again. Will figures that many of these Polx must be eating a few loaves each of the stuff. So much for dinner.

Near what must be the end of the ritual, one of the Elders motions to Magnus and offers her a large crust sporting spiral seed patterns on it with both hands. He has white hair and a white beard and his eyes are glittering. Instead of accepting the whole thing, instead even of eating a portion like so many of the Polx had done, Magnus tears away only a very small piece which she lets rest in the center of her cupped palm. Then, she turns to face Will.

She looks lovely in the firelight, hair dark and eyes bright from the pleasures of the day (visiting old friends, walking along the tree-lined paths of fresh fallen snow to the frozen lake, mulled wine and stories over the fire). Will listens and studies her face while she speaks in their lilting language, and he thinks there is something quite beautiful about simply listening without understanding, but also there’s something in his boss’s voice that makes him wish he knew exactly what she was saying.

When she reaches the end of the small speech, of whatever short recitation she’d repeated for them, everyone’s smiles grow wide and every pair of eyes drift slowly over to Will.

Will chuckles nervously. His own eyes dart to Magnus, confused, wondering if perhaps it was his turn to do something. Why was everyone staring?

But then she spoke quietly. “Don’t worry, Will.” Her smile is reassuring. “You don’t need to say anything.” She holds up her hands now, offering the bread to him with an expectant look on her face. 

Obediently, Will opens his mouth and takes it from her palm, like he had watched all the others do. Her fingertips brush the edges of his jaw as she pulls away.

The Polx begin to clap and laugh and hug one another. The ceremony appears to be over.

Will looks back at Magnus. Her head is tilted thoughtfully and she is still smiling right at him.

 

There is dancing and music and drinking late, late into the night. The moon is full and everything glows silver and gold, sharp contrasts of ethereal wintry light.

The Polx are a very friendly, touchy, affectionate people. They hug and kiss and caress one another joyously, swapping dance partners after each and every song. Earlier in the day, Will was walking around with the arms of two handsome, bearded Polx men thrown good-naturedly across his shoulders. The women introduced themselves and immediately reached to hold his hand. Total strangers kissed his cheeks in greeting as he passed them.

Tonight however, Will and Magnus stand beside the fire and mostly, they’re left alone. The Polx cast nothing but grins and respectful nods their way.

“Don’t tell me you’re feeling neglected,” Magnus’ voice comes from beside him. “I seem to recall earlier in the day you mentioning something about a ‘personal bubble’?”

Will chuckles. “Hey, the lack of inhibition was growing on me. Now they’ve all paired and tripled and quadrupled up. Is this part of the tradition?”

Magnus squints into the fire. “Sort of,” she says. 

Her eyes find his. “Would you like a dance partner, Will?”

Will doesn’t want to assume that Magnus is asking him to dance, even though it feels like it. That really isn’t like her. He grins stupidly anyway. “Do you think it would be taboo of me to ask? We’re guests here, after all.”

Magnus studies him. “Let me. Language barrier, and all.”

The very pretty and petite Narlia (Will’s been eyeing her since he got here) glances over at him while Magnus approaches and talks to her. Narlia is one of the Elders. She looks suprised that Will wants to participate.

Narlia dances with Will once, and she is as lovely and gracious towards him as she was this morning, but afterward she brings him straight back to Magnus.

 

“They act a lot differently after ritual, don’t they?” Will asks Magnus later, unrolling the straw sleeping mat he’d been given.

Magnus is tending to their small fire. “It’s a very important ceremony to them, Will. It is a time to re-dedicate themselves to their values, to their friends and family. To future bonds. That’s what the poppy seeds are for. Fertility, abundance. ”

“Yeah, what was that about?” he asks. “When Ailan gave you the bread. What did you say to them?”

Magnus smiles and shakes her head. “I think you may be better off not knowing.”

Will tilts his head incredulously. “Try me.”

“Very well,” she relents. “You must have realized that the Polx are a plural marriage society. They are pansexual and polyamorous. It is inseparable from their religious doctrine.”

“I did get the whole ‘free love’ vibe from them, yes,” Will says, archly.

“Well, they will respect monogamy and a more reserved disposition, but only if you inform them outright. They are very steadfast in their beliefs, they do not proselytize and they do not judge others for theirs. That having been said, if you do not tell them that you have a different value system or a different way of conducting yourself, they will expect you, as guest in their sacred space, to participate in theirs.”

Will eyes her carefully. “So...”

“So I thought you might be uncomfortable with their advances,” Magnus tells him. “Many non-Polx would be.”

“I was okay with them earlier,” Will offers.

Magnus appraises him with a raised brow. “Maybe. But after ritual they become more...insistent.”

Will considers this for a moment. “So tell me what this has to do with what you said to them back there, with the bread, and everything.”

The smoke is rising in steady, delicate spirals from the fire now, and Magnus leans back, twists to face him more fully in the light-and-shadow of their small teepee while sounds of merriment continue on outside. “The Time of Unity and Renewal is rather like a fertility festival,” she says. “The bread is given to and from potential love interests and sexual partners among the Polx as a symbol of generosity and reciprocity. If you do not receive bread from someone, you cannot sleep with them or pursue a relationship. If you do not give bread to someone, you cannot sleep with them or pursue a relationship. Since you didn’t understand the full symbolism, I excluded us both from participating further.”

Will is staring at her, mouth slightly agape. It is dawning on him, now, the implications of her actions during the ritual. “So when you gave me the bread...”

“They understood that we do not wish to participate at this time. Like I said, respect was perfectly maintained on both sides.”

Will smiles. It does make sense. “Yeah but, you gave me that bread, just you, and you didn’t receive any. But I accepted it.”

Magnus is watching him carefully again. Her jaw moves a little. Because Will is smiling, she begins to, also. “Yes,” she says simply. Infuriatingly.

“So?” he asks, expectantly. After a few moments of silence, he tilts his head at her, raises both brows, and Magnus concedes.

“So,” she begins on an inhale, “they understand that you are mine, Will, and that nobody else may have you.”

Will’s heart starts to pound; he swallows thickly. He attempts to recover. “What about you?”

“What about me?” she asks.

“Who do they think you belong to?”

The corner of her mouth curls slowly, devastatingly upwards. “I belong to no one,” she says with a wealth of subtext.

“I could have reciprocated,” Will blurts. “I mean, you know, just to be fair. Return the favor.”

“This is the only year I’ve excluded myself from ritual,” Magnus says, and his mouth goes dry.

“Really?”

The thought thrills Will in ways that it shouldn’t, ways he cannot fully acknowledge right now, but Magnus is suddenly looking very serious, like he’s pulled some sort of trigger.

“Why?”

She looks away, shrugs. “Because, I--I don’t know, Will.” She glances back at him. They both know she is lying because usually, she isn't so horrible at it. Her eyes are wide and alert in the firelight. For a few long, long seconds she simply stares at him.

Finally, Will speaks into the silence. “Do they...do they think we’re together? Like, together together?”

“Undoubtedly,” she says. “It is rather explicitly implied in the sharing of the bread.”

“I want to give you that bread,” Will tells her. “I would have. I didn’t know.”

She smiles, looks away. “Sweet, Will.”

“Would you have let me?” he asks, surveying the unreadable profile of her face.

A few beats pass, but then she tilts her head back up. “Yes.”

It is a softer answer, less infuriating than the last simple ‘yes’ she’d given him. Unsure of where exactly they stood at this moment, whether or not they were still talking theoreticals and liturgy and abstaining from what might be considered by some uncomfortable Native ritual, Will leans back with a hand propped behind his head and watches the smoke funnel out the makeshift chimney.

It’s quiet for a long time. Will has been thrown so many curve balls during his time at the Sanctuary that even though this one is entirely different, it almost feels the same.

“I’ve never brought anyone out here before,” Magnus says suddenly. The fire crackles. “I’ve never wanted to.”

Will stays perfectly still, listening, but Magnus seems to be done talking.

“Goodnight, Will.”

Will keeps on waiting, but she doesn’t say anything else. After a minute or two, he reaches across the small space between them and trails a hand down her back. She stiffens for a moment, but then relaxes.

It’s surreal, and it’s weird, because somewhere in the last two hours they’ve crossed some sort of invisible line. Helen Magnus is still his boss and his mentor and his friend, but now for the first time he finally lets himself think about her as someone he desires. As someone who has desires herself. He can’t tell whether it makes the situation more or less intimidating.

"I'm glad you let me," he says to her. "It's been an honor." This time, it is Will's words that hold a wealth of subtext.

Slowly, Magnus begins to drag her hand toward his. They meet at the crook of her neck. Magnus tangles their fingers together and after a moment, he hears her long exhale.

 

In the morning, Will wakes to warm breath against his wrist. He blinks into the circle of sunlight, and then glances to Magnus. She’s already awake. His palm is against her cheek and she’s got the fingers of her left hand wrapped around his forearm.

The morning light catches the gold in her hair and eyelashes and something about this moment feels overwhelmingly intimate. He can’t stop staring. Had they held hands the whole night?

Her eyes flicker over to him. “Good morning,” she says softly.

“Good morning,” he murmurs.

Something she sees in his face makes her smile. She presses her lips into the curve of his palm and he hasn’t even sat up yet, but already he feels dizzy. 

After breakfast, they say their goodbyes to the Polx. During the meal, Magnus touches him frequently, unnecessarily. Her hand at his back, a brush of her knuckles to his cheek and neck and arm.

Will thinks that even if they’d never come here, even if he’d never accepted that bread from her last night, it wouldn’t matter anyway because they both know he’s already belonged to Helen Magnus for years.

 

 **4**.

The rebel camp is quiet now. No gunfire, no screaming (for now).

Will stands beneath the square of tarp that is serving as a makeshift tent to keep out of the rain.

When she appears, she’s wearing a long black coat and her hair is falling in thick wet streaks across her forehead and cheeks. She looks solemn and out of breath and so fiercely, effortlessly beautiful. Will spends a brief second feeling sorry for each and every person that Helen Magnus counts among her enemies.

“Reminds me of when we first met,” he says, gesturing out at the rain, when she stops right in front of him. She quirks a brow. He amends. “The meeting I remember, anyway.”

“That one, yes,” she says, and she reaches for his face with fingers curled inward. Brushes the backs of them across the flushed pink bruise on his cheek. “And I’m afraid I’ve hurt you once more.”

Will winces. His jaw is still very sore. “Helluva right hook,” he tells her. “Almost like you meant it. I’ll heal.”

Magnus’ hand falls back to her side. “I know you will.”

“Addison is moving the troops tonight,” Will presses on.

“Then we move, too. Get everybody to safety. Have Kate help you, and Abby too, if you wish. Please,” she adds, seeing the look on Will’s face.

“Magnus, what are you _doing_?” He feels so, so lost. He’s trying not to feel abandoned, too.

“Asking you again to please trust me.”

Her palm is suddenly sliding against his, and her thumb gives his wrist a little reassuring pressure. It is familiar and he doesn’t want her to stop. When she pulls away, something remains in his hand.

“Leap of faith, Will,” she says.

 

Hours later, he is in a cheap motel room and Abby is in the shower. He can hear the pipes clanking from where he sits numb-limbed on the old gray mattress. Will aches all over, aches bone and soul-deep. The Hollow Earth abnormals are all safe, but somewhere across town his home is still burning.

Will fishes into his pocket. The piece of paper has a Chilean address on it, and a few brief, veiled instructions. He remembers the way Magnus looked when she gave it to him, like she wanted to tell him something more. Her eyes had drunk him in like it would be the last time. He looks down again at the note, at the elegant slope of her handwriting, and hopes to god this means it wasn't.

 

 **5**.

For still being mostly a secret, the new Sanctuary sure has a hell of a lot of people showing up for its New Year’s party. Sure, most of them are residents, but still. Will spends a rare afternoon off abusing his helium balloon-filling privileges with Henry and he thinks Magnus takes the day off, too, even though it’s probably killing her. He’d insisted that she relax for at least a few hours, and instead of giving him a clipped reply and ignoring the suggestion outright like she’d done so many times before, she’d only smiled and nodded defeat. She’d thanked him like he was the one giving her permission (one of the many small things that had begun to shift, once again, between them).

 

As the clock counts down from ten, Helen and Will catch each other’s eye from across the pavillion tent. For some reason, she’s looking at him like he’s the only person in the crowd. Richard Feliz has his arm around her waist and they share a chaste kiss as confetti rains down from the canopy. Will is still watching her when she squeezes Feliz’s hand and lets him wander back over to the bar. 

Not long after, she makes her way over. A tray of full champagne flutes is resting on one of the tables between them, and she snags two as she twists around it.

“Hey,” he says, smiling. 

She hands him a glass. “Hello.”

“Richard Feliz, huh?” he asks.

Helen rolls her eyes, amused. “Yes, quite the charmer. He’s the man who knows where all our money is, Will, I thought one of us should impart some flattery. Would you rather it have been you?”

“Ha, ha.”

“Enjoying yourself?” 

The night has proceeded smoothly enough and Will’s had a few beers, so he gives her a genuine nod. “You?”

Helen smiles and nods, too. They stare at one another for a few more seconds and when Helen takes her bottom lip between her teeth, Will squints at her because she’s _thinking_ something now, but not saying it.

“I know that look,” he tells her.

“I just...” she starts, and then falters. Will’s eyes grow wide and amused because Helen seems a shade flustered and it’s a color he’s never really seen on her. 

She laughs, shakes her head. Tries again. “I just think you look very handsome tonight, Dr. Zimmerman.” 

What she really wants to tell him is that his existence has been the most invaluable anchor, that just seeing him here in the center of their brave new world each day makes every lonely decade, every worry, doubt or mistake she’s ever made seem worth it. He makes the parts of herself she can’t reconcile seem like things that can be forgiven. It’s been such a long time for her but she still feels the same about him. With Will beside her, she feels like she can start all over again as many times as it takes.

He has mostly forgiven her for dragging him around blind for the better part of a year (or two, or three) but there’s still a hesitance there.

“Will you walk with me?” Helen asks.

 

The stars are so bright it makes them dizzy if they stare off into the domed sky for too long. When Helen closes her eyes to them, she can still see thousands of tiny silver studs shining and swirling behind her eyelids.

She slips her arm through Will’s as they walk, and folds her hand around his. They walk and she watches him, and she thinks he knows that her eyes are on him even though he won’t meet her gaze. That she wants to be _here_ instead of back at the party isn’t lost on him, though. 

After a few minutes Helen stops and leans against one of the pavillion poles, but she doesn’t let go of his hand. Instead she uses the leverage to tug him closer. She does it gently so that it’s his choice how close he comes to her.

“Will, if...if I....” but she falters again, and their gazes swap so that now, she’s the one avoiding his eyes while he studies her face.

“Magnus,” he says. “Helen. What’s up?”

With one arm around him and the other trailing mindlessly down the pole, she starts to laugh. Something about it sounds like releasing pressure from a valve. “I’ve missed us,” she tells him. “I’ve missed you.”

“We’ve been through a lot together,” he smiles. His heart is swelling, despite himself.

“I hope you haven’t tired of the adventure I promised,” she says. Even though he had chosen to come back, chosen to stay, she’ll always worry about losing him in one way or another. “Plenty more to be had.”

He comes closer, close enough that Helen has to stop fiddling with the pole and rest her hand on his elbow instead. “I’ve got a few more in me,” he assures her.

Helen smiles. Breathes in. “William,” she begins, “what I was going to say is that it’s a brand new year. We still have so much ahead of us.” It is nearing the wee hours of the morning but she’s still wide awake and warm beneath his hands. “Couldn’t we use a bit of luck?”

“Yeah,” he agrees, unsure of where she’s going with this but allowing himself to be carried along and mesmerised by her anyway. “Sure. Absolutely.”

“Many cultures hold the belief that on this night, a failure to kiss the person you care for can lead to ill tidings.”

Her hand has drifted to his cheek, and he closes his eyes. Furrows his brows.

“Will,” he hears her whisper. “May I?”

She doesn’t really wait for an answer though, and he doesn’t really wait for the press of her lips against his. They meet somewhere in the middle.

 

\--


End file.
